NGRF - UK National Guidance Research Forum

It is inevitable that for policy makers, impact analysis might be expected to reflect how career guidance links to government agendas. Such expectations could shift analysis of impact from holistic investigation and enquiry, to the potentially more suspect arena of meeting the requirement to demonstrate success against project criteria. A careers adviser may sense that soft outcomes such as increased motivation, increased self confidence or greater self awareness are beneficial to individuals, but how can that perception be translated into a more robust measurement? If it is possible to find a mechanism for impact analysis that relates to professional experience, then it could be a basis for improving practice. Subjective anecdote needs somehow to metamorphose into a more robust evidence base, and from this perspective impact analysis needs to find a mechanism by which to capture those impressions. Employing organisations inevitably dictate how practitioners spend their time.

Impact Analysis could take a different form, it might link to broader aims such as partnership development, maintenance of a service, productivity judged in terms of numbers of clients seen with effectiveness of individual interactions placed in a broader context of efficiency. A cynic might argue that sustainability of project funding may at times seem to link more to correctly completed paperwork than the quality of an individual client’s experience. For the individual on the receiving end of guidance impact analysis may be even harder to pin down. It may link to the extent to which a client’s expectations have been met, but given that some research suggests expectations of careers guidance are at times pitifully low, that may be an insufficient guide. Equally a client may initially perceive their encounter with guidance negatively because it was challenging in some way, but over time recognise this as having value in helping them to face up to issues that needed to be addressed. In isolation, the client perspective, though pivotal, may not be enough.